Sunday, 30 September 2012

Welcome to the blog that answers your
questions about everything in the entire universe throughout all recorded time, weather permitting.

@clangerfan1 Is it ever ok to eat
Wotsits on the sofa?

Unfortunately not. The principles governing
what can and cannot be eaten on a sofa were drawn up by The Royal Guild of Upholsterers
at the Council of Chesterfield in 1573. The fourth paragraph reads “Also herewith
forbidden on any settee, easie chaire or Pouffe by this Auctoritee is the consumption
of chese or mete that hath byn toasted or grilled by any means whatsoever, or
resolved into a form of any mooreish Snacke not yet discovered.” The haphazard
spelling of the Chesterfield Statutes lead to the Case of Regina versus Walkers
Crisps (1974), when the makers of Wotsits claimed that “mooreish” here meant “of
North African Islamic origin”. Walkers won, and for two years in the mid
seventies Wotsits were eaten on all kinds of upholstered furniture but the
decision was reversed following an appeal in the High Court by The Noble Fellowship
of Kebab Carvers.

No. It would be true, for example, in the following conversation between
this week’s guest incompatible couple Jatalie and Timpert.

Jatalie: Are
you breaking up with me because I am someone who is only able to deal with
emotionally-charged situations by resorting to trite platitudes?

Timpert: No,
it’s me, not you.

@amticketybooWhy is Richard Marx waiting for me right there?

Oh dear. I’m afraid there’s been a
terrible misunderstanding. Pop/rock singer-songwriter Richard Marx isn’t right there. He was right here, waiting for you. He turned up in 1989 and moped around the
kitchen for 22 years droning on about his non-specific heart problems and
whether you’d maybe misunderstood the arrangements. In the end I had to ask him
to leave as his haircut was becoming a liability.

candyflossandvodka Who would win
in a fight? An orange or a lemon?

A lemon is sharper.

@GrassRootsMgrWhich has helped
advance humanity the most, gloves or shoes?

We have certainly come a long way in shoes, but there
are still some areas where gloves have the upper hand, as anyone who has tried
to take a casserole out of the oven using a stiletto slingback can attest. Mittens
on the other hand have only held humanity back. Since Vaarsijd Innsijd’s
invention of the mitten in sixth century Norway over 140,000 days have been
spent looking for lost children’s mittens, the equivalent of 5.1 parents’
entire lives.

@Testudo_Aubreii What would the world be
like if water moved under its own volition instead of going where gravity told
it to?

Our best illustration of this is perhaps
the events following the Wilson government’s nationalization of gravity in August
1967. Unfortunately the newly-formed British Weight Board and the National
Water Council could not agree on who had responsibility for making water go
downhill, and in the absence of any effective regulation several small rivers began
to go uphill and Lake Windermere slowly tipped on its side, making it popular for
downhill water-skiing. More confusion was to come in October when rain across
the country began to fall up as well as down, and by November ceiling baths had
become the norm and sales had rocketed for umbrellington boots. Wilson
effectively ended the crisis that month, reassuring the nation that water
weighed the same as it always had in his famous “the pound in your bucket”
speech, and emergency legislation was passed throughout England bringing water
back under the laws of physics. However by an oversight the legislation failed
to mention Wales, where to this day rain comes at you from every possible
direction.

That’s all for now. Next time why not try
Some Kind of Explanation with a generous helping of homemade custard?

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About Me

I'm a writer and producer, making comedy shows on the radio and tv. Among the shows I've produced are Still Open All Hours, That Mitchell and Webb Look and Sound, It Is Rocket Science, Warhorses of Letters and Bleak Expectations. I write picture books for the under 5s including The Big Animal Mix Up, The Littlest Bird and The DIsgusting Sandwich. And I'm on Twitter as garethmammal.
The BBC think I ought to tell you that they don't necessarily agree with everything written in this blog, although they do agree with this sentence.